Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.
I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.
Not fulfill in the sense of finishing and setting aside. Jesus took upon himself the curses that were invoked by the way the law that had been violated in the past. He himself lived in perfect obedience to the law. He did this, not merely for our sakes, so that we wouldn't have to worry about obedience ourselves, but so that "the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit" (see Romans 8:4). John summarized the difference Jesus made when he wrote that "the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ" (see John 1:17). The law was fulfilled by Jesus as though it were waiting on him to finally achieve the purpose for which it was given.
Circumcision was never meant to be a merely external reality but point to the need of an inner transformation. Yet the law had to content itself with merely external obedience until Jesus came to change our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh. People set one aspect of the law against another in order to justify themselves and their behavior until Jesus made it possible for his followers to seek first the Kingdom, which meant taking up their own crosses and following him. We need faith to please God (see Hebrews 11:6) since we know that "to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace" (see Romans 8:6). Our fallen flesh fends for itself. We need access to a higher mode of reality, and a better way of being, to which faith is the doorway. It allows us to share what Jesus did for us, but especially what he now wants to do in and through us.
Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away,
not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter
will pass from the law,
until all things have taken place.
In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus deepened and internalized many aspects of the law, from the prohibition against killing, to that against committing adultery, to that against swearing falsely. This helped to illustrate that the point of the law was not merely to regulate external behavior, but to point to the sort of people we should want to become. It contained not only prohibited behaviors. When analyzed, it revealed genuine goods those prohibitions were designed to protect. Yet the condition of the people at the time required that exceptions sometimes be made for the hardness of their hearts (see Matthew 19:8). And these, not the law proper, were set aside by Jesus, as no longer necessary in the new economy of grace.
For what great nation is there
that has gods so close to it as the LORD, our God, is to us
whenever we call upon him?
Or what great nation has statutes and decrees
that are as just as this whole law
which I am setting before you today?
The law was meant to be received as a blessing, and the people did in fact receive it that way. However, preoccupation with the letter of the law allowed individuals to use it to insulate themselves from God's true plan and intention for them. Jesus incinerated that insulation in the fire of truth so that the law could achieve what Moses had so long ago said that it could: helping to draw near to God. Therefore may we too obey and teach it.
Maranatha! Music - I Will Delight (In The Law Of The Lord)
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